China News Service, June 12. On the 11th local time, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky delivered a speech in the form of video at the 19th Shangri-La Dialogue.
Afterwards, some foreign media reported that the Chinese delegation "suddenly left" during Zelensky's speech, which caused heated discussions.
However, some participants at the scene soon said: "It was not the Chinese delegation that left, but the Vietnamese delegation." The "rumor maker" also deleted the relevant posts, and the rumors were self-defeating.
The "rumor maker" is a US think tank analyst
The source of the "Chinese delegation leaving", the most circulated on the Internet, was sent by Olivia Enos, a policy analyst at the American think tank "Heritage Foundation", on her social media.
Olivia Enos, a policy analyst at the Heritage Foundation, a U.S. think tank, posted on her social media that the Chinese delegation left when Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky gave a speech.
Image credit: social media
Enos later deleted the tweet, but according to a screenshot of the tweet, she posted a photo of Zelensky's speech at the time, with the caption: "Zelensky was speaking at the Shangri-La Dialogue while the Chinese delegation has left."
After the relevant news was released, it quickly fermented, and foreign media such as the Ukrainian Independent News Agency also reported on the topic "The Chinese delegation leaves during Zelensky's speech".
Participants at the scene refuted the rumor: it was the Vietnamese delegation
Under Enos' tweet, Tang Anzhu, a former U.S. Department of Defense official who was also present at the meeting, directly refuted the rumor: "That was the Vietnamese delegation, and they passed my seat when they left. I was sitting in China at the time. Next to a colonel officer of the delegation".
Tang Anzhu, a former U.S. Defense Department official, replied to Enos: The Vietnamese delegation left.
Image credit: social media
Afterwards, Enos replied to Tang Anzhu's comment and admitted that she had indeed "made a mistake".
In addition, it is reported that the reason why the Vietnamese delegation left was not to carry out some kind of "protest", but to rush to attend another meeting.
This is not the first time such rumors
Zelensky also gave a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, in May, when CNN published a story falsely claiming that Zelensky's video speech ended at the end of his speech. The audience stood up for a standing ovation, but the Chinese delegation did not stand up and left.
The CNN report also quoted a participant at the scene, US Congressman McCall, who claimed to have taken a photo of the Chinese delegation refusing to applaud and leaving the room.
However, after verification, the photos he provided were actually members of the Vietnamese delegation.
After the incident, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said in response to relevant inquiries on the matter that China urges relevant U.S. lawmakers to make corrections and stop spreading false information.